Welsh Journals

three months". The society's first victory was won. "But", its first general secretary added, "we have a long way to go before Gower will be safe". Ten Journals later, an unsigned editorial could claim that the society had grown to be the largest of its kind, not only in Wales but in Scotland and England as well. "Many are the fights it has won", said the writer (a Gwentian declaration, surely). Gower had just been designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty-the first area to be given that status. The Gower Special Area Sub-Committee had been formed, and its chairman, County Councillor Jenkin John, who was also chairman of the County Planning Committee, had announced that "in Gower private interest will take second place to public interest". So the editorial writer in Gower X felt he could comment that "the battles for preserving Gower would appear to be over, provided that public opinion backs up the National Parks Commission and the Gower Special Area Sub-Committee". But time and the developer have proved that designation is not an impregnable defence. True, development has been controlled (imagine, for one horrific moment, what Gower would look like today if there had been no designation order, no Special Area Sub-Committee-and no Gower Society) and the larger part of coastal Gower has been preserved through purchase by the National Trust and the Glamorgan County Naturalists' Trust. But the sad fact is that in its twenty-fifth year the main activities of the Gower Society have been opposing two major threats of commercial development in Gower- the Clyne Common development plan and the scheme for chalet develop- ment in the beautiful and unspoilt Cheriton Valley. These two schemes have alerted us to the fact that it is not only the coastlands which call for continuous vigilance. The unique charm of Gower lies in the varied character of its scenery within a small area. Moreover, as Gwent Jones pointed out in that Gower I article, the Gower Society em- braces "the whole of historic Gower-the Gower which even now is accurately represented by the Parliamentary Division which our President represents" (true today when our President is the Member for Gower as it was when his predecessor, D. R. Grenfell was our fiist President): "from Crymlyn Bog in the east, over the hills of Mynydd Drummau, across the Tawe to Mynydd Gelliwastad, Mynydd y Gwair and Cefn Drum, over- looking Pontardulais and the Llwchwr Valley. This is Gower, and right in the middle of it is its historic capital, Swansea"-a point which will be given a new significance when Gower and Swansea become an entity in the new local authority set-up. So, the society's silver jubilee year is a time for reviewing past achieve- ments with pride and renewing the resolve to resist every bid to disfigure the fair face of Gower. The past year has brought one heartening event-publication of A Strategy for Gower, the Glamorgan County Council Planning Depart- ment's recommendations for future policy in the Special Area. In pre- paring this 42-page document the department was mindful that con- struction of the M4 motorway into Swansea and the prospect that car ownership in South Wales could increase by fifty per cent in ten years would put ever-increasing pressure on the peninsula, and the report warns